For the record, IA stats on armour is that Thunderhawks have 55-65 mm of armour, Land Raiders and Warhounds have something like 95mm, and Reavers have 120mm. Yes, thats right, Reavers have about 380-460mm RHA equivalent, which means that any modern MBT ought to be able to totally demolish a Titan. Hell I'd be willing to bet even older (WW2 or so) era anti tank weapons should be able to down a titan. Nevermind a Land Raider or Thunderhawk.

We turned France into something resembling the surface of the moon during WW1 and that didn't require nukes just lots of conventional artillery and since lots of tanks and shit TA can do that's easy to believe.

Interesting, I didn't know we blasted the entire surface of France down to bare rock in a week, oh wait we didn't, if we did France wouldn't exist.

This is NEWSBOT reporting to you LIVE from the Malfest sector! Throughout most of the week, neither side was able to craft a considerable advantage, and several planets in the sector were reduced to bare rock, dust and destroyed war material as they changed hands back and forth.

This is a little bit more impressive than WWII artillery. I wonder how much energy it would take to reduce the Earth to bare rock and dust? It really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are but what we do know is that they can raise a massive army extremely quickly and this massive army can deliver enough firepower to turn whatever planet they appear on to something resembling Mars in a week. If they can do this in a week using up the resources of a galaxy in 4000 years actually makes sense.

@Simon_Jester The calculation comes from a laser weapons calculator online, anyway I really don't expect to blast through 13km of tungsten in a second making a 9mm wide hole, the actual point was that a laser that focused should be able to do alot of damage at least on the level of the ability to blast through a tank, as for the area that comes from the manual stating that Peewees can focus the power of their weapons into a micrometre sized area. The power was actually chosen at random, 4 MW seemed conservative enough.

This is NEWSBOT reporting to you LIVE from the Malfest sector! Throughout most of the week, neither side was able to craft a considerable advantage, and several planets in the sector were reduced to bare rock, dust and destroyed war material as they changed hands back and forth.

This quote you are using comes from the Galactic Wars campaign reports that came after the Core Contingency expansion. That involved hundreds of Commander vs Commander battles each day. That is completely different from the hypothetical scenario posed which involves a single Commander.

Also the following Galactic War report argues against the claim of gigatons of firepower being chucked around:

The walls of Glynholm castle blistered and cracked under the force of the Core siege machines. Smoke poured out the windows of the northeast wing, flames licking at the ancient stone, stood for generations, like the orange tongue of serpents of old.

Plasma shells rained down from afar, thudding against the hardened walls, shaving them away in showers of gray dust. A mighty Krogoth Kbot burst through the west wall with a kick of unimaginable force to those who had originally constructed this fortress.

It was a castle built at some very ancient point in the past by people in an apparent primitive level of development as it uses plain old stone. It was used as the center of government by the Arm sympathizers in that particular sector, but no matter how megalomaniacally massive this ancient fortress is supposed to be, it is still ultimately made of stone. Even if the walls are ludicrously thick, it is still stone, worked at some point in the past by masons.

The plasma shells raining down from the Core siege machines are only shaving them away in showers of dust. They are not completely vaporizing the entire castle in one blow. Shells doing that to stone walls is not consistent with a claim of gigatons of firepower. In the end, it shows how the west wall is physically kicked in by a Krogoth superheavy kbot. Even Godzilla is not kicking at the equivalent of gigatons of firepower, yet the wall caved in, meaning it took less than gigatons to cave it in, and yet those plasma shells were unable to do so in one blow. Ergo, those plasma shells have less power than what you are claiming.

gamer wrote:Interesting, I didn't know we blasted the entire surface of France down to bare rock in a week, oh wait we didn't, if we did France wouldn't exist.

Well originally you didn't say bare rock did you, you said "galactic war reports suggests TA can turn an earth-like planet into something resembling the moon in a couple of weeks starting with just one unit." Now I don't know about you but to me the moon looks barren and covered in craters and according to these pictures of No Man's Land; One, Two, and Three so did the battlefields of WW1. Now obviously not all of France got blasted, I was using hyperbole, a concept you seem to have trouble with.

gamer wrote:

This is NEWSBOT reporting to you LIVE from the Malfest sector! Throughout most of the week, neither side was able to craft a considerable advantage, and several planets in the sector were reduced to bare rock, dust and destroyed war material as they changed hands back and forth.

This is a little bit more impressive than WWII artillery. I wonder how much energy it would take to reduce the Earth to bare rock and dust? It really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are but what we do know is that they can raise a massive army extremely quickly and this massive army can deliver enough firepower to turn whatever planet they appear on to something resembling Mars in a week. If they can do this in a week using up the resources of a galaxy in 4000 years actually makes sense.

It would take more energy than you've ever demonstrated TA is actually capable of generating and would be inconsistent with what we actually see in the game and your not-cherry picked Galactic War reports. However as Iracundus pointed out that this battle involved hundreds of Commander battles a day which means huge TA armies I see no reason why they couldn't pull a WW1 No Man's Land over a whole planet. Of course you'd have to grant some hyperbole on the part of the Galactic War Report but it would fit.

gamer wrote:@Simon_Jester The calculation comes from a laser weapons calculator online, anyway I really don't expect to blast through 13km of tungsten in a second making a 9mm wide hole, the actual point was that a laser that focused should be able to do alot of damage at least on the level of the ability to blast through a tank, as for the area that comes from the manual stating that Peewees can focus the power of their weapons into a micrometre sized area. The power was actually chosen at random, 4 MW seemed conservative enough.

You seemed to think it would work as advertised to me, but whatever. It's funny that you take Simon_Jester's word on the aspect ratio problem yet you kept ignoring me, even though I even posted How to Build a Laser Death Ray's own explanation of it back on page 4, but again whatever.

For the record, IA stats on armour is that Thunderhawks have 55-65 mm of armour, Land Raiders and Warhounds have something like 95mm, and Reavers have 120mm. Yes, thats right, Reavers have about 380-460mm RHA equivalent, which means that any modern MBT ought to be able to totally demolish a Titan. Hell I'd be willing to bet even older (WW2 or so) era anti tank weapons should be able to down a titan. Nevermind a Land Raider or Thunderhawk.

The amusing thing, is that "gigatones of firepower" quote is the total firepower of a battle which lasted a good 2-3 hours and involves probably a total of 500-800 units over the livespan of the battle for the two sides combined. The old 'calcs' done years ago assumed 20-30 minutes(rather than the whole game) and at most 200 units, which is cherry picking like hell.

Total annihilation battles, once past the initial build up and skirmishing stages, devolve into expending large numbers of functionally expendable units to smash each sides infrustructure faster than it can be rebuilt or untill a lucky strike hits the Commander.

"Okay, I'll have the truth with a side order of clarity." ~ Dr. Daniel Jackson."Reality has a well-known liberal bias." ~ Stephen Colbert"One Drive, One Partition, the One True Path" ~ ars technica forums - warrens - on hhd partitioning schemes.

I'll also point out simply pulling firepower out of the raw unit stats isn't going to work. All non-laser weapons have AOE, with the damage being applied using an inverse cube relationship (with a scaling constant) over the blast radius. The hard range cut-off is easily explainable as because Total Annihilation is about an army of robots, not squishy humans which shrapnel can easily kill.

"Okay, I'll have the truth with a side order of clarity." ~ Dr. Daniel Jackson."Reality has a well-known liberal bias." ~ Stephen Colbert"One Drive, One Partition, the One True Path" ~ ars technica forums - warrens - on hhd partitioning schemes.

Xon wrote:The amusing thing, is that "gigatones of firepower" quote is the total firepower of a battle which lasted a good 2-3 hours and involves probably a total of 500-800 units over the livespan of the battle for the two sides combined. The old 'calcs' done years ago assumed 20-30 minutes(rather than the whole game) and at most 200 units, which is cherry picking like hell.

Well yes and no. Looking at the "briefing" here Several things of interest pop out.

Coldfire's troops pressed their final charge, overwhelming the last of Gnug's battered and surprised troops, driving them into the ground with gigatons worth of explosive power.

That actually suggests a fairly short timeframe for delivery (they mention 'two hours before', so I'd assume the barrage is less than that.) Timeframe isn't really the issue though. Its the lack of info on numbers and what weapons are inflicting the gigatons. Nuclear weapons are mentioned as used in that same report, and I gather from the game that they're also pretty much one of the heaviest weapons deployed, and would thus most likely represent what is inflicting the 'gigatons' if any weapon is. But unless they're landing right on top of the units, I gather they're relying on proximity hits to inflict damage (EG within the blast range of the weapon = take damage) and that means they're only going ot be taking a small fraction of the energy of said 'gigatons'

Furthermore, an explosive device and an energy weapon are not the same thing, nor do they inflict damage in the same way. Nukes (or any other kind of explosive) are going to be inflicting their damage over square metres of surface area, unless they're somehow contriving some sort of focused detonation like a shape charge (and it doesn't sound like most do.) A beam weapon can concentrate its energy on a much smaller area (really effective lasers, like the ones Luke Campbell talks about on his site, invariably do this.)

Numbers wise, 'hundreds' sounds like gameplay, but I also gather (from the various reports) we're talking about massive battles going on, and 'hundreds' does not really strike me as massive. I mean they have armour, artillery, ships, as well as 'infantry', and these are supposed to be battles deciding an entire planet. TA strikes me as the sort of game where you'd want to ignore the gameplay stuff or, at best, treat it as an abstraction (EG unit is a group rather than a singular object.)

For a massed nuclear barrage meant to knock down, "overwhelm" and "drive into the ground" a force of armored combat-walkers and robotic battletanks, across a continent-wide area... gigatons wouldn't be entirely out of line. The US and USSR had war-plans that would entail quite literally throwing "gigatons" of nuclear firepower at each other in the form of ICBM warheads.

But that doesn't mean individual combat units are slinging around gigatons of firepower, or that anything less than the largest strategic nuclear missiles have anywhere close to that. So in a fight between Peewees and Necron warriors, those "gigatons" of firepower are totally irrelevant, unless you're seriously going to propose that the Necrons would lose to Cold War Soviets.

Simon_Jester wrote:For a massed nuclear barrage meant to knock down, "overwhelm" and "drive into the ground" a force of armored combat-walkers and robotic battletanks, across a continent-wide area... gigatons wouldn't be entirely out of line. The US and USSR had war-plans that would entail quite literally throwing "gigatons" of nuclear firepower at each other in the form of ICBM warheads.

But that doesn't mean individual combat units are slinging around gigatons of firepower, or that anything less than the largest strategic nuclear missiles have anywhere close to that. So in a fight between Peewees and Necron warriors, those "gigatons" of firepower are totally irrelevant, unless you're seriously going to propose that the Necrons would lose to Cold War Soviets.

the way this threads been going I wouldn't be supriced, though I dout Connor would do that.

I may be an idiot, but I'm a tolerated idiot"I think you completely missed the point of sigs. They're supposed to be completely homegrown in the fertile hydroponics lab of your mind, dried in your closet, rolled, and smoked...Oh wait, that's marijuana..."Einhander Sn0m4n

like most 40K factions Necrons aren't exactly monolithic in their capabilities. There is that bit from (I think the 4th edition manual) where Necrons are so worn down and predictable that killing them is used as part of PDF training on some world. Hellforged (and a few other short stories) had some pretty un-impressive Necrons too (PRINTED CIRCUITS IIRC). And then there are other examples, like Fall of Damnos.

Depending on the size of the force and what both sides are bringing to the battle , its not impossible for modern forces to defeat them, even without nukes. Its not like you exactly need gigatons to take down Necron Monoliths either. One of the things I hate about 'modern vs sci fi' comparisons is that lack of specifics.

Given the way that "normal," "average," or what have you Necrons are presented, if you seriously attempt to declare that they'd lose to Cold War Soviets, you're doing it wrong. It's a screw-up on par with, say, declaring that there is no faster-than-light travel in Star Trek.

I'm sorry, but this is the future, some of the things like man-portable energy weapons are pretty damn impressive, and that whole "when you blow them limb from limb their corpses teleport away and are rebuilt on another planet to fight you again" thing is very difficult to handle.

This is not to say that you couldn't blow up individual Necrons, or even Necron vehicles, with real world weapons. But unless they're so deeply fucked up and mindless that they are well below average, a serious Necron attack scaled appropriately to defeating a planet full of 21st century troops would be pretty damn hard to stop. Sure, if some idiot sent half a dozen Necrons to conquer the world they'd lose, but that's not the point; the point of the exercise is to assume that both sides are handled with roughly equal degrees of competence, and that both sides actually brought enough force to fight the battle.

If it's any consolation, I don't think the Cold War Soviets could defeat Total Annihilation, either. Sure, a barrage of tank fire might put down quite a few K-bots, but the ability to spam units that quickly would wear down practically any real world army- you'll run out of antitank rockets before they run out of things that take antitank rockets to kill, so your only chance is saturation nuclear bombardment of their base before they produce enough units to overrun you.

There's a legitimate question on how effectively the Necrons could handle a nigh-endless swarm of individual units, or whether they'd react fast enough to preempt the rapid buildup. But it's a miserable, pathetic parody of a versus argument for people to jump up and down and shriek about how one side has an overwhelming firepower advantage based on some random mumbles in an obscure side-source distantly affiliated with the game.

Simon_Jester wrote:There's a legitimate question on how effectively the Necrons could handle a nigh-endless swarm of individual units, or whether they'd react fast enough to preempt the rapid buildup. But it's a miserable, pathetic parody of a versus argument for people to jump up and down and shriek about how one side has an overwhelming firepower advantage based on some random mumbles in an obscure side-source distantly affiliated with the game.

As I previously mentioned, there just isn't enough known about Necron industrial or repair capabilities or turnaround times. Also so far there has still been no quote showing the supposed complete rebuilding of a new body for a Necron in case of total bodily destruction. The ability or inability of new Necron construction would determine whether there would be such a thing as permanent Necron losses, however unlikely. If the Necrons are reliant on repair and activating mothballed units, and have little new construction capacity, then however deep their pockets, it means a long enough war of attrition might eventually grind them down. However such economic and industrial comparisons are hard given the lack of clear hard data on both sides, and the existence of essentially "magic" at the hands of the Crypteks.

However, one thing that needs to be clarified also is that the Galactic War reports are not "an obscure side-source distantly affiliated with the game", although yes there are internal inconsistencies that undermine the hyperbolic claims of ridiculous amounts of firepower per unit. The Galactic War reports were released directly by Cavedog, the IP holder, not a third party, and at least several canonical game units were released by Cavedog through the Galactic War online campaigns. This is official in the same way that GW's release of the Eldar Night Spinner vehicle, including some fluff background, through the White Dwarf magazine is official and canonical or how the account of the 3rd War of Armageddon on the GW campaign website is supposed to be official. Does GW ever wax hyperbolic or have internal inconsistencies? Sure, but that doesn't mean the sources of GW's websites and White Dwarf magazine are themselves suddenly dismissed.

The question does ultimately become less about individual awesome firepower and more about industrial/repair capacity. Both the Necrons and TA universe rely essentially on swarms of expendable units if we are going to be ending up talking about a planetary warzone. The individual techno-magic of a Cryptek (however they do what they do), and the destroy everything with no remains D-gun of a TA commander, would be drowned out simply by the scale of a full planetary war. It doesn't matter if you have a gun or magic beam that reliably destroys a tank in one shot, if there are hundreds or thousands of such units being thrown around.

Essentially what I am saying is the claims of TA simply walking all over the Necrons are excessive, but similarly given the massive production capacities shown by TA, the claim that Necrons will simply walk all over TA are also excessive. This is for the given scenario which involves a planetary warzone, without invoking space based assets or unique super weapons of either side. I think what would happen would be a war of attrition, with the outcome unknown, and which would also vary given any further parameters of the scenario such as the size of the tomb, its activity level, how well it survived its long sleep, and what level the TA force builds up to before being detected and engaged. Obviously if the TA Commander is engaged in heavy fighting literally the instant it arrives then I don't think it would last long.

gamer wrote:Interesting, I didn't know we blasted the entire surface of France down to bare rock in a week, oh wait we didn't, if we did France wouldn't exist.

Well originally you didn't say bare rock did you, you said "galactic war reports suggests TA can turn an earth-like planet into something resembling the moon in a couple of weeks starting with just one unit." Now I don't know about you but to me the moon looks barren and covered in craters and according to these pictures of No Man's Land; One, Two, and Three so did the battlefields of WW1. Now obviously not all of France got blasted, I was using hyperbole, a concept you seem to have trouble with.

gamer wrote:

This is NEWSBOT reporting to you LIVE from the Malfest sector! Throughout most of the week, neither side was able to craft a considerable advantage, and several planets in the sector were reduced to bare rock, dust and destroyed war material as they changed hands back and forth.

This is a little bit more impressive than WWII artillery. I wonder how much energy it would take to reduce the Earth to bare rock and dust? It really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are but what we do know is that they can raise a massive army extremely quickly and this massive army can deliver enough firepower to turn whatever planet they appear on to something resembling Mars in a week. If they can do this in a week using up the resources of a galaxy in 4000 years actually makes sense.

It would take more energy than you've ever demonstrated TA is actually capable of generating and would be inconsistent with what we actually see in the game and your not-cherry picked Galactic War reports. However as Iracundus pointed out that this battle involved hundreds of Commander battles a day which means huge TA armies I see no reason why they couldn't pull a WW1 No Man's Land over a whole planet. Of course you'd have to grant some hyperbole on the part of the Galactic War Report but it would fit.

gamer wrote:@Simon_Jester The calculation comes from a laser weapons calculator online, anyway I really don't expect to blast through 13km of tungsten in a second making a 9mm wide hole, the actual point was that a laser that focused should be able to do alot of damage at least on the level of the ability to blast through a tank, as for the area that comes from the manual stating that Peewees can focus the power of their weapons into a micrometre sized area. The power was actually chosen at random, 4 MW seemed conservative enough.

You seemed to think it would work as advertised to me, but whatever. It's funny that you take Simon_Jester's word on the aspect ratio problem yet you kept ignoring me, even though I even posted How to Build a Laser Death Ray's own explanation of it back on page 4, but again whatever.

Actually I said barerock so many times I got tired of it and just said moon. Also when I say moon I'm actually being quite literal, I've seen pictures of WWI no man's lands and that doesn't look like the land was blasted down to bare rock and dust, it doesn't look like the moon, just a bloody battlefield.

Also the Galactic War Report didn't mention how many commanders there were but this battle encompassed an entire galactic sector, specifically the Malfest sector, so possibly hundreds of commanders but probably not hundreds of commanders per world.

Reducing entire planets to bedrock and dust in a week or possibly less is a bit more impressive than WWI artillery, a WWI no man's land just isn't in the same scale, especially since in TA producing anti-matter and strategic scale nuclear weapons is trivial. You can say maybe they meant something resembling a no man's land but really if I wrote a story and said the entire earth was blasted down to barerock and dust in a week are you really going to imagine a WWI no man's land or are you going to imagine something resembling Mars?

As for that castle, that castle is obviously not a medieval style castle the sheer size of the castle is surprising even to the commanders present. It's "stone" walls can withstand blasts from 10,000,000 degree plasma and hyper-focused weapons fire, and during the castle assault they mention ARM and CORE units fighting each other and blindling blasts of light coming from the horizon due to anti-matter weapons fire. Anyway it really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are its not like the Necrons are going up against a single Peewee or Annihilator. One problem I see with the Necrons is time, they don't seem like the type that will respond immediately to threats

And the aspect ratio problem, yes I know its not likely to blast thin long holes (13kmx9mm) into armor like what the website calculated without some specific labratory like conditions, what I was trying to point out is that, Peewees definitely have at least anti-tank firepower blasting open a 40k tank with their rapid firing guns should be quite trivial with a weapon that highly focused and yet they can tank a few shots from their own guns as well.

And a single commander can be a big threat to an entire galaxy in TA the Core essentially get destroyed by the ARM but from a single commander they were able to rebuild their forces into a potent fighting force, which threatened to wipe out the ARM.

gamer wrote:Also the Galactic War Report didn't mention how many commanders there were but this battle encompassed an entire galactic sector, specifically the Malfest sector, so possibly hundreds of commanders but probably not hundreds of commanders per world.

Were you actually there playing during the online campaign? There could be that many Commander vs Commander battles per day on a single world. There were front lines. Just because the sector as a whole was contested did not mean all the worlds of the sector were not simultaneously being fought over at the same time.

As for that castle, that castle is obviously not a medieval style castle the sheer size of the castle is surprising even to the commanders present. It's "stone" walls can withstand blasts from 10,000,000 degree plasma and hyper-focused weapons fire, and during the castle assault they mention ARM and CORE units fighting each other and blindling blasts of light coming from the horizon due to anti-matter weapons fire. Anyway it really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are its not like the Necrons are going up against a single Peewee or Annihilator. One problem I see with the Necrons is time, they don't seem like the type that will respond immediately to threats

Immense size doesn't mean it cannot be medieval or primitive. The Great Wall of China is immense yet was built using pre-modern technology. Your use of "stone" is deliberately trying to set up something which has no evidence: i.e. you are trying to imply that isn't really just stone. The stone walls are not withstanding in some magical impervious fashion. They are being eroded down by the plasma shell impacts, but cave in entirely when hit with something more substantial like the Krogoth k-bot's kick, which was itself supposedly at a force unimaginable to the original builders of the fortress. The Krogoth's abilities are easily measurable and quantified by the modern forces in the TA universe itself. The original builders were therefore at a level before the modern TA level.

You are also getting lost in the whole ten million degree thing. If you throw a tank shell sized ball of 10 million degree plasma at a mountain, the mountain will withstand it despite being made of natural stone. There would be some stone blown off but the entire mountain is going to withstand it and not going to be blown up. Something being extremely hot doesn't mean it blows everything up.

Your mention of the lights from anti-matter weapons fire is an irrelevant impressionistic statement. So what? We know anti-matter and matter annihilation reactions release energy in forms that are detectable even today. As written in the report, there were hundreds of Commanders fighting for that sector capital world. We know Commanders blow up when containment fails on their anti-matter backpacks. All those statements really just mean there are forces fighting, and there are explosions happening. None of which has any relevance to the issue of the walls being stone.

And a single commander can be a big threat to an entire galaxy in TA the Core essentially get destroyed by the ARM but from a single commander they were able to rebuild their forces into a potent fighting force, which threatened to wipe out the ARM.

The time frame taken for this rebuilding of infrastructure and war capability is never stated or even hinted at. The Galactic Wars portrayed by the reports could be taking place decades or centuries after the original first Core defeat.

gamer wrote:Actually I said barerock so many times I got tired of it and just said moon. Also when I say moon I'm actually being quite literal, I've seen pictures of WWI no man's lands and that doesn't look like the land was blasted down to bare rock and dust, it doesn't look like the moon, just a bloody battlefield.

Also the Galactic War Report didn't mention how many commanders there were but this battle encompassed an entire galactic sector, specifically the Malfest sector, so possibly hundreds of commanders but probably not hundreds of commanders per world.

Reducing entire planets to bedrock and dust in a week or possibly less is a bit more impressive than WWI artillery, a WWI no man's land just isn't in the same scale, especially since in TA producing anti-matter and strategic scale nuclear weapons is trivial. You can say maybe they meant something resembling a no man's land but really if I wrote a story and said the entire earth was blasted down to barerock and dust in a week are you really going to imagine a WWI no man's land or are you going to imagine something resembling Mars?

What I imagine is actually dependent on what the story has previously demonstrated. Since TA has demonstrated not-nuclear scale firepower in regular units and only has nuclear firepower with nuclear weapons I'd imagine something more like a Fallout style wasteland. Which is like Mars only in so much that they're both deserts, but with a loose enough interpretation can be described as "bare rock, dust and battle ruins" what with all the massive deforestation and sand and everything. Of course that is not the literal interpretation I guess you would take.

As for that castle, that castle is obviously not a medieval style castle the sheer size of the castle is surprising even to the commanders present. It's "stone" walls can withstand blasts from 10,000,000 degree plasma and hyper-focused weapons fire, and during the castle assault they mention ARM and CORE units fighting each other and blindling blasts of light coming from the horizon due to anti-matter weapons fire. Anyway it really doesn't matter how strong the individual units are its not like the Necrons are going up against a single Peewee or Annihilator. One problem I see with the Necrons is time, they don't seem like the type that will respond immediately to threats

A really big stone castle is still a stone castle, there are quite a few large stone structures on Earth so it's not unreasonable someone somewhere decided to build a castle crazy big out of regular stone. You're also doing the thing where you use techno-babble and expect it automatically translate into high-power again. Besides if this castle is so freaking huge and made of stone it would need very thick walls for structural support which would add lots of resistance to weapons fire by its very nature. Also anti-matter/matter reactions release a lot of gamma rays which will be absorbed by the atmosphere and re-released as visible light, so any anti-matter explosion will release a blinding flash of some size.

For the Necrons response time it really depends on the Tomb World and how functional it is.

And the aspect ratio problem, yes I know its not likely to blast thin long holes (13kmx9mm) into armor like what the website calculated without some specific labratory like conditions, what I was trying to point out is that, Peewees definitely have at least anti-tank firepower blasting open a 40k tank with their rapid firing guns should be quite trivial with a weapon that highly focused and yet they can tank a few shots from their own guns as well.

My problem was never with a Peewee having anti-tank firepower, it was with the absurdly long thin holes. It seems we were talking past each other.

And a single commander can be a big threat to an entire galaxy in TA the Core essentially get destroyed by the ARM but from a single commander they were able to rebuild their forces into a potent fighting force, which threatened to wipe out the ARM.

That's in the TA universe where they have the galactic gate network to move the Commander around. The commander in this scenario is limited to what he can build himself.

Iracundus wrote:Also so far there has still been no quote showing the supposed complete rebuilding of a new body for a Necron in case of total bodily destruction.

I couldn't find any thing about building a new body for Necrons in the codex despite my earlier recollection at this time, I'll give it a more thorough read later but I did find these.

p.33 Codex:Necrons wrote:Even dismemberment or decapitation cannot be counted upon to stay a Necron Warrior's advance, for its sophisticated self-repair mechanisms can return it to the fray within minutes.

p.45 Codex:Necrons wrote:Canoptek Scarabs are constructs, designed to break down organic and non-organic matter into raw energy. This harvested energy can then be woven into fresh forms at the direction of the Scarab's controller.

p.33 Codex:Necrons wrote:Even dismemberment or decapitation cannot be counted upon to stay a Necron Warrior's advance, for its sophisticated self-repair mechanisms can return it to the fray within minutes.

p.45 Codex:Necrons wrote:Canoptek Scarabs are constructs, designed to break down organic and non-organic matter into raw energy. This harvested energy can then be woven into fresh forms at the direction of the Scarab's controller.

The p.33 reference is referring to the ability of Necron Warriors to self-repair in the field and get back up to fight. When they are sustain damage beyond the capability of their own self-repair mechanisms then they are recalled back to a tomb complex. Field self-repair isn't quite the same as the issue of industrial capacity for new production.

The other parts of that p. 45 reference mentions how the Canoptek scarabs create spare parts, or else further Spyders, Scarabs or Wraiths. However these are still essentially maintenance and security robots. The issue was about actual new Necron production. The Necrons are the memories and personalities of an organic race, the Necrontyr, downloaded into metal bodies and forms. There has been no evidence shown thus far of any ability to actually make new Necrons. The Necrons in existence in 40K are all derived from the Necrontyr, meaning there is a finite and capped Necron population. If a Necron should somehow be completely destroyed beyond hope of any repair by a Necron tomb complex, that would mean the Necron population permanently shrinks.

Now someone has claimed the mind of the Necron is recalled to a tomb and a new body built for it, but has provided no proof of this. Also it still doesn't quite address the issue of new Necron production as even such a process is preservation of an existing Necron mind, not creation of a new one.

I couldn't find any thing about building a new body for Necrons in the codex despite my earlier recollection at this time, I'll give it a more thorough read later but I did find these.

I believe the thing which helps the necrons the most is their "Necrodermis" ie the metal their made from, in the codex I think it's described as living metal.

As far as Necron resurrection, I was able to find this on the GW website.

The Resurrection Orb. This glowing sphere focuses energy into the regeneration circuits of surrounding Necrons, hastening their repair and allowing them to rejoin the battle. For many races, seeing the enemies they have just killed rise back up again is entirely unnerving.http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catal ... id=2175392

Tomb Spyders can apparently do the same thing.

Here's an excerpt from the wh40k lexicanum, which takes its info from the wh40k fifth ed. rule book. unfortunately I do not have a rule book on me right now.[spoiler=]In appearance, the Necrons are skeletal parodies of living beings with swirling green energies emanating from their mechanical limbs and baleful lifeless emerald eyes. All of their numbers possess sophisticated auto-repair systems throughout their exo-skeletal systems that can repair even the most crippling of damages. While this can keep them functioning constantly, should there be irreparable damage sustained, the Necron "phases out". Both their minds and their bodies are teleported to the nearest tomb complex where they either remain in storage until repairs are made or a new body is forged. This act does, however, come at a cost as each act of transferrence leads to a decay in the Necron's engrams. As such, those Necrons that have "died" and phased out hundreds of times suffer the most for they become little more than automatons who have lost the memory of the creature that they used to be in life.[/spoiler]

gigabytelord wrote:As far as Necron resurrection, I was able to find this on the GW website.

The Resurrection Orb. This glowing sphere focuses energy into the regeneration circuits of surrounding Necrons, hastening their repair and allowing them to rejoin the battle. For many races, seeing the enemies they have just killed rise back up again is entirely unnerving.

Again this is not new Necron construction but repair of a destroyed Necron body in the field. People are repeatedly confusing the separate issues of field repair vs. new Necron construction. The Resurrection Orb just increases the effectiveness of the Necron existing field repair ability.

The issue was about whether Necrons have any ability to expand beyond their existing capped population.

Here's an excerpt from the wh40k lexicanum, which takes its info from the wh40k fifth ed. rule book. unfortunately I do not have a rule book on me right now.

Lexicanum is not a canon source as it is a 3rd party wiki. It doesn't use direct quotes but instead paraphrases, which has in the past allowed all sorts of subtle errors and exaggerations to creep in. Maybes or possibilities get mistaken for certainties, and theories get taken for facts. Its citations are also at times vague, basically citing entire books, and making it impossible to determine where a specific piece of information in an article entry came from (or whether it was made up) short of trawling through multiple books yourself.

Again this is not new Necron construction but repair of a destroyed Necron body in the field. People are repeatedly confusing the separate issues of field repair vs. new Necron construction. The Resurrection Orb just increases the effectiveness of the Necron existing field repair ability.

I don't know dude, having the ability to repair yourself after receiving almost catastrophic damage right in the middle of combat, seems like it might be a huge bonus.

The issue was about whether Necrons have any ability to expand beyond their existing capped population.

According to the new Necron codex, they are actively working on way to expand they pop cap via engineering new bodies, will check that info at another time.

Lexicanum is not a canon source as it is a 3rd party wiki. It doesn't use direct quotes but instead paraphrases, which has in the past allowed all sorts of subtle errors and exaggerations to creep in. Maybes or possibilities get mistaken for certainties, and theories get taken for facts. Its citations are also at times vague, basically citing entire books, and making it impossible to determine where a specific piece of information in an article entry came from (or whether it was made up) short of trawling through multiple books yourself.

Actual quote from 5th ed rulebook.

Necrons are skeletal parodies of the living, with preservative fluids oozing from mechanical joints and baleful emerald wychfires blazing in lifeless eyes.Although Necrons can differ according to rank and function, all have sophisticated auto-repair systems coursing through their exoskeletons, allowing recovery from all but the most critical of damage.Should irreparable damage occur, the Necron 'phases out'. Body and consciousness are teleported to the nearest tomb complex, where they remain in storage until such time as repairs can be effected or a new form can be forged.

gigabytelord wrote:I don't know dude, having the ability to repair yourself after receiving almost catastrophic damage right in the middle of combat, seems like it might be a huge bonus.

Which again is not the point. There isn't any debate over whether this ability is useful or not. The issue was whether the Necrons can actually expand their Necron population. Answering on a different topic doesn't actually address the original issue.

According to the new Necron codex, they are actively working on way to expand they pop cap via engineering new bodies, will check that info at another time.

Is the concept of the issue of making new Necrons i.e. new Necron minds and personalities really that hard for people to understand? It isn't about making a new metal body for an existing Necron mind to move into, or repairing damaged Necron bodies, but whether Necron minds are limited in numbers by the however many survived their long sleep. There is to my knowledge no example of a new Necron mind being created. All the Necrons in existence contain the minds of ancient Necrontyr. Making a new body for an existing mind doesn't increase the population. All it does is recycle the existing population of Necron minds into new bodies.

Also you appear to have misinterpreted the parts in the Necron Codex where some Necrons are seeking new flesh and blood bodies to transfer their consciousness back to so they can again be organic Necrontyr. That again is an entirely separate issue from that of making new Necrons.

Necrons are skeletal parodies of the living, with preservative fluids oozing from mechanical joints and baleful emerald wychfires blazing in lifeless eyes.Although Necrons can differ according to rank and function, all have sophisticated auto-repair systems coursing through their exoskeletons, allowing recovery from all but the most critical of damage.Should irreparable damage occur, the Necron 'phases out'. Body and consciousness are teleported to the nearest tomb complex, [color=#FF0000]where they remain in storage until such time as repairs can be effected or a new form can be forged.

Well first, your quote isn't directly sourced to a page, however I know the section you are referring to. It notes "body and consciousness" and again describes telportation of a body when the body is damaged but there is something physical to recover. However the issue is what happens when there are no physical remains to recover, which for purposes of this thread and scenario might occur if hit by a Commander's D-gun.

From the new Necron Codex:

Should a fallen warrior fail to phase out, it self-destructs and is consumed by a blaze of emerald light. p. 6, new Necron Codex

What happens to the Necron mind? Is it destroyed entirely? If so then the Necron population has just shrunk by one. Another poster in this thread has claimed that the Necron mind is still recovered even when the body is completely destroyed, but there is no quoted evidence provided. Also there is the issue of how fallible such a system is, since if the phase out system is fallible as shown by the Codex then why shouldn't any mind recall system?. If there are never any new Necron minds being produced, any failure and loss of an old Necrontyr mind, however rare, would be a permanent decrease to the Necron population.

Which again is not the point. There isn't any debate over whether this ability is useful or not. The issue was whether the Necrons can actually expand their Necron population. Answering on a different topic doesn't actually address the original issue.

Technically this isn't the point of the thread either, the point is to determine who would win in a stand up fight between ARM and the Necrons, not to debate whether or not Necrons can survive total body destruction.

Is the concept of the issue of making new Necrons i.e. new Necron minds and personalities really that hard for people to understand?

You keep saying that, over and over, I fully understand what your getting at, and I have been looking through the fairly restricted material I have, to try and find an answer to this question, I must admit that I have been unable to do so yet, and until this happens I will concede this point.That being said I find it distasteful when someone attempts to insult my intelligence, if I'm wrong I'll freely admit it.

It isn't about making a new metal body for an existing Necron mind to move into, but whether Necron minds are limited in numbers by the however many survived their long sleep. There is to my knowledge no example of a new Necron minds being created.

See above.

All the Necrons in existence contain the minds of ancient Necrontyr. Making a new body for an existing mind doesn't increase the population. All it does is recycle the existing population of Necron minds into new bodies.Also you appear to have misinterpreted the parts in the Necron Codex where some Necrons are seeking new flesh and blood bodies to transfer their consciousness back to so they can again be organic Necrontyr. That again is an entirely separate issue from that of making new Necrons.

Quick question, if they're organic again, doesn't automatically mean that they can reproduce at will?

Well first, your quote isn't directly sourced to a page, however I know the section you are referring to. It notes "body and consciousness" and again describes telportation of a body when the body is damaged but there is something physical to recover. However the issue is what happens when there are no physical remains to recover, which for purposes of this thread and scenario might occur if hit by a Commander's D-gun.

page 178-179Care to explain what a D-Gun is and how it works? Don't forget to provide canon proof of it's effectiveness.

What happens to the Necron mind? Is it destroyed entirely? If so then the Necron population has just shrunk by one. Another poster in this thread has claimed that the Necron mind is still recovered even when the body is completely destroyed, but there is no quoted evidence provided. Also there is the issue of how fallible such a system is, since if the phase out system is fallible as shown by the Codex then why shouldn't any mind recall system?. If there are never any new Necron minds being produced, any failure and loss of an old Necrontyr mind, however rare, would be a permanent decrease to the Necron population.

Apparently, but I will add that this seems to have turned into a CORE vs Necrons fight, I apologize that I did not receive the memo.

PS also don't the CORE copy memory chips? Not upload directly from host upon the host's death?

gigabytelord wrote:Quick question, if they're organic again, doesn't automatically mean that they can reproduce at will?

It would if they had actually managed this transfer to being organic again. However the Codex doesn't say anyone has actually succeeded in doing this, only that it is what some Necrons seek to do.

Care to explain what a D-Gun is and how it works? Don't forget to provide canon proof of it's effectiveness.

The D-Gun is a special gun carried by the Commander unit. From the TA manual:

This is an 'ultimate' weapon: no physical matter provides protection from it. It works by suppressing the quantum field strength of the 'gluons' that hold together atomic nuclei. The matter violently tears itself apart, leaving hydrogen, deuterium and a burst of free neutrons. This is the major advantage of Disintegrators: anything is destroyed and Heavy Armor provides virtually no protection.

The weapon has a number of disadvantages: First the matter is disintegrated so no metal salvage is possible. Second, the weapon is short ranged, partly because of the inherent physical limitations of reasonably sized projectors, and partly due to atmospheric attenuation of effect. The most severe restriction is the vast amount of energy required to fire it.A useful attribute of the weapon is that it damages everything in a cone of effect so it can destroy several units that are clustered together.

p. 48-49, TA game manual

From the background description above, the atomic nuclei of the hit target breaks up with into fragments of only hydrogen or deuterium nuclei with bursts of free neutrons, leaving no salvage of "metal" in TA terms.

In TA, it allows for one shot destruction of any target (and does so in the game itself) at the cost of 400 game units of energy per shot. That might sound like a lot but for a mature war economy in TA, it is a minor expenditure. The range is short, and that is the main disadvantage as it means the Commander unit must get fairly close to the target, and this can be risky if there are numerous or very powerful enemy units. One advantage of the gun in the game is that the shot fires up to the extent of its range and can destroy multiple units in its path (i.e. the shot is not stopped by the first unit it hits). So a skilled Commander with sufficient energy reserves can destroy virtually any ground unit that gets within the range of the D-gun. The only real way to overcome is through sheer numbers to wear down the Commander's armor or through out ranging the D-gun.

Apparently, but I will add that this seems to have turned into a CORE vs Necrons fight, I apologize that I did not receive the memo.

PS also don't the CORE copy memory chips? Not upload directly from host upon the host's death?

What are you talking about? What does Core have to do with any of what was stated before?

The Arm developed high-powered combat suits for its armies, while the Core transferred the minds of its soldiers directly into similarly deadly machines. The Core duplicated its finest warriors thousands of times over. The Arm countered using cloning.p. 2, TA game manual

The Core is composed of patterns which can be duplicated. Nothing is specifically said about the patterning process being fatal or harmful specifically. However nothing is said about Core recall of minds if a unit is destroyed. There might be loading a copy from a backup perhaps but the actual specific pattern of that one specific unit does not appear to survive destruction.

Arm uses mass cloning to fill the ranks of its fighting machines. These clones die if their machines are destroyed. Again, the specific mind is not saved or recalled anywhere.

However the relevance is that both Core and Arm forces in TA are able to expand their population base, whether it be through pattern duplication, patterning of new organic beings, or mass cloning. Necrons in 40K don't appear to be able to duplicate existing Necron minds. Some Necron minds become lost forever from attrition during their long sleep when their tomb complexes are overcome with natural forces or other disaster. Nothing seemed to save those minds or recall them elsewhere or anything. So once lost, they were lost forever. The numbers of Necron minds that now exist seem to be the hard cap on the population of the Necron race, as they don't seem to do any new Necron mind creation or reproduction.

The relevance of this to the original discussion is whether a prolonged enough conflict might negatively impact the Necron population in a permanent way if there are losses from the D-gun. Being reduced to a cloud of hydrogen, deuterium, and free neutrons is different from being "destroyed" in a conventional manner that might still leave a shattered wreck of a Necron body that might be repaired or that might still somehow preserve the Necron mind.

Iracundus wrote:Which again is not the point. There isn't any debate over whether this ability is useful or not. The issue was whether the Necrons can actually expand their Necron population. Answering on a different topic doesn't actually address the original issue.

The answer to that is and always has been "we don't know." While it would logically be possible for them to make new bodies using copied minds, and we've seen a C'tan once show up and make new necrons in the middle of nowhere, we don't know if they're generally willing to do so, it seems quite likely that they are not.

Fortunately for the necrons, some of their most lethal units, Canoptek Wraiths, Spyders and Scarabs for example, or Tomb Stalkers, are full-on robots, which they can manufacture in any desired quantity. The Black Crusade adventure book "Hand of Corruption" shows the manufacture process in some detail, it's done by matter-energy-matter conversion, and sophisticated 3d printing from energy to matter in "synthesis chambers" A new Tomb Stalker can be ready to fight in minutes, if the whole system is up and running, and there are no obvious "population caps" or any such thing on the expansion of that system.

Even if their numbers are fixed, that doesn't mean their combat potential is limited.

There is also no reason to believe that they are limited in their production of armored vehicles except by their resources and desires.

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NecronLord wrote:The answer to that is and always has been "we don't know." While it would logically be possible for them to make new bodies using copied minds, and we've seen a C'tan once show up and make new necrons in the middle of nowhere, we don't know if they're generally willing to do so, it seems quite likely that they are not.

Fortunately for the necrons, some of their most lethal units, Canoptek Wraiths, Spyders and Scarabs for example, or Tomb Stalkers, are full-on robots, which they can manufacture in any desired quantity. The Black Crusade adventure book "Hand of Corruption" shows the manufacture process in some detail, it's done by matter-energy-matter conversion, and sophisticated 3d printing from energy to matter in "synthesis chambers" A new Tomb Stalker can be ready to fight in minutes, if the whole system is up and running, and there are no obvious "population caps" or any such thing on the expansion of that system.

Again can you provide quotes to back up these claims of Necron creation whether by Necrons or by C'tan? I believe you were also the one that claimed Necrons can recall minds when the body is destroyed. Can you produce a quote for that as well?

The singular uniqueness of the various Necron characters would suggest against the ability to copy minds. Why else would Necron generals still be valued if it were a simple matter to just copy them over endlessly into new bodies? For example, The Necron Lord Zahndrekh (p. 60-61, new Necron Codex) is valued for his abilities as a commander despite being deluded in believing he is still fighting ancient wars from when he was flesh and blood.

Even if their numbers are fixed, that doesn't mean their combat potential is limited.

Actually it would in so far as anything specifically Necron related is concerned. The Canoptek Wraiths, Spyders, and Scarabs are maintenance and security bots. They aren't the main force used by the Necrons in fighting or reclaiming their domains. The vast majority of the forces in the Necron Codex are Necrons not these Canoptek forces. Every Necron permanently destroyed would be one permanently less Necron Warrior, Necron Immortal, or whatever able to act as a frontline soldier. Building a new Spyder or Wraith doesn't fill that emptied role.